LIZ JONES: I lived the Devil Wears Prada life – here’s why I loved it

I’ve just been to see The Devil Wears Prada 2. And I loved it.

I saw it late, as subtitled screenings are few and far between – and forget me ever being invited to a world premiere. I went to a cinema on some industrial estate, with a branch of B&M (200 puppy-training pads for £20, don’tcha know; I’m on a slippery slope, having bought track pants from Lidl for under £8). You get the vibe. I felt like Miranda, who, when summoned to a meeting by her new boss, asks, incredulous, ‘We have a cafeteria?’ And, ‘When can I relax? In a coffin?’ And ‘Can you go faster?’ I once yelled out the window at my gardener, ‘Walk faster!’ I am not here to mock Miranda: she’s a soul mate. I cannot tell you how those email sign-offs from 20-somethings saying, ‘I work Tuesdays to Thursdays’, make me want to stab them in their dewy throats.

I loved that not one of the cast members looks 20 years older. There are some great lines: ‘Don’t carb-shame me.’ And ‘Is Miranda hanging up her own coat?’ I hated Andy’s new love interest: a bore whom even with that wide mouth she couldn’t be bothered to snog. I’m staggered Kenneth Branagh stooped to play Miranda’s new beau; when I started out as a journalist, he was my second celebrity interview (after Rupert Everett; I was completely in love with him, too naïve to realise he was gay). Kenneth actually phoned my landline. But I was put off by the fact he had so many plants in his rented house; I was worried he’d want me to water them.

But the film reminds me of a wonderful world I was once part of. Shopping in the Galleria Vittorio in Milan, I bought a black pencil skirt suit by Prada, buoyed by a 40 per cent discount, given I was a glossy editor. I was introduced to prosecco for the first time. I was driven to Lake Como, to a dinner hosted by Donatella Versace, the last few miles lit by four-wick Diptyque candles.

The film is less escapist than the first. It is all about the death of journalism, print. It’s about slashed budgets and the omnipresence of online, of how well a feature performs – as CC Baxter might say – numbers-wise. Reviews have been savage, and chippy. One female columnist wrote, ‘For women my age, to be positioned like Andy, as a questioning heroine, above the thick hotties who spent all their time thinking about eyelash curlers, was revolutionary.’ Um. Caring about your appearance doesn’t mean you are stupid. It means you are unafraid to try, that you respect others, that you are not arrogant.

I really can’t stand posh Oxbridge graduates who think they are above make-up, are fine just as they are. How about you try washing, deodorant, straighteners?

What chimed most was the line, ‘Remember when magazines were a thing?’ Reading a magazine in the bath feels like a treat, whereas streaming feels like work. My whole life is mapped out in print: early Cosmos, stolen from a sister. Honey. 19. Elle, with Yasmin soon to be Le Bon on the cover. The Face, featuring the Kamen brothers – my best friend cast Nick in the famous Levi’s launderette advert. And Vogue, always Vogue. Of all the treasures I have sold on Ebay to keep my head above water, I regret selling every issue I bought and stored, in chronological order, from September 1977. Magazines have always been there for me, to lift me out of my mundane life. Sloane Condren, with rags in her hair, shot by Bruce Weber. Janice Dickinson, with her Galaxy counter eyes, who made me feel I didn’t have to be blonde to be beautiful.

The Devil Wears Prada 2 is an homage to those days, easy to dismiss as a romcom, a tale of silly women in tall shoes. But to a shy girl with acne from Essex, never underestimate the power of those images, of dreamy, impossible clothes, Maud Frizon peeptoes, Mary Quant moss eyeshadow. That world saved me. It would be so sad if it ceased to exist, lost to a world of Insta adverts, lies, instant gratification. DWP2 is like a lip balm: soothing.

It reassures us that those of us who care about nice things are not stupid at all.

JONES MOANS… WHAT LIZ LOATHES THIS WEEK

• Diffusers. You put them in the bathroom and after two disappointing years they merely stickily gather dust, and you never do get a hint of fragrance.
• When you buy jeans, the website asks for your waist measurement. Why not just ask if you’re a 10 or a 12? Why are jeans so special?